General Music Chat

As a musician, I sometimes add a new song to my repertoire.
If it’s a difficult song, then when I practice it I’ve learned to recognize the point of diminishing returns: more effort, less results.
That’s the time to switch songs: I drop it, and go on to other songs I‘ve previously worked with.
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For some reason, we learn easier if we wait a couple days and play other songs in the interim.
It might be that we “can’t see the forest for the trees,” and playing the other songs will bring us out of the forest, so to speak.
- Alan

Yup.

Every so often not playing at all for a couple days seems to tighten me up. Or I'll fool around on the keyb to make the guitar jealous.

Talbot

Cover songs - all the time. With the deaths of Michael Brown (Left Banke), Jimmy Greenspoon (3 Dog Night) and Andy Fraser (Free) last week, I added Walk Away Renee, One and All Right Now to my list and did them all last night. All Right Now goes back to my high school band days, but doing it solo on acoustic is a challenge!

Originals - I've got 4 or 5 songs in some kind of production stage, another 12 or so that are in final mix-tweaking stage.

Here is my trivia entry for the day.

In the 70s the first band job I got in LA was with a guitar player who while of moderate ability was amiable and reliable - we soon fleshed out the band. (very poor choice of words since I moved in with the girl singer)... and played some gigs. (not in Hollywood - nobody with ambition plays covers in Hollywood)

This fellow had one very cool item and that was the harpsichord upon which he swore 'Walk Away Renee' was originally played in the studio. I have no idea if that was true but even then it looked sort of 'retro' but still sounded good.

A lovely song with lots of story behind it.

Talbot

We're constantly adding new songs, 2 or 3 mostly ready now and 4 new ones on the list to work on. New Kid in Town, How Long - both Eagles songs, mostly ready, Can't Get it Out of My Head - ELO is now on the set list I think, I Need Somebody and Cuts Like A Knife by Bryan Adams both half ready, working on Run to You. And somebody mentioned Gerry Rafferty last weekend so now Baker Street and Right Down the Line are both in progress. Also just got a couple of others ready, Little Sister - I think Elvis did it first, Robert Plant is the only version I've ever heard, Pink Floyd's Breathe just wen ton the practice list, I'm pushing them to do Sorrow too, maybe Run Like Hell, Son of A Son of A Sailor is mostly ready, Cat's in the Cradle (Harry Chapin) probably ready, and a couple of others I can't think of.

We spend about 20 minutes or so on a song, move on to something else, come back to it later in the night. Same thing I've done since I was in high school band, that's how our band director did things. Worked then, I see no reason to change. For practice at home I do the same thing, except that for the first few days I just listen to it 30 times to get the song in my head, then start seriously working on guitar parts. Usually when we get to band practice we all 3 have the songs in decent shape so we can concentrate on vocals. We do a lot of vocal harmonies, and I want to be able to focus on vocals rather than learning the chord progression and leads. Chords don't take me long, but I spend a lot of time working out specific leads if I want to duplicate the original.

Good list so far, I've posted a few here and there but here's a lot of our current set list.

Eagles -
Take it Easy
Peaceful Easy Feelin
Lyin Eyes
Desperado
Love Will Keep Us Alive
Heart of the Matter (Don Henley)
Witchy Woman
Tequila Sunrise
New Kid In Town almost ready
How Long almost ready

Doobie Brothers
Long Train Runnin
Rockin Down the Highway
Ukiah/The Captain and Me (both together same as on the album)
Dark Eyed Cajun Woman
Listen to the Music
Another Park Another Sunday
Black Water

Thinking about a couple of others

America
Sandman
Ventura Highway
Sister Golden Hair (in progress)
Daisy Jane (in progress)

Poco
Rose of Cimarron
Crazy Love
Magnoila (JJ Cale song, Poco version)

Crosby Stills and Nash
Southern Cross
Our House
Helplessly Hoping
Just a Song


Plus a bunch of others in addition to the ones already named in progress. Tons of vocals, and a lot of those I want the guitar part as close as I can get, and for Baker Street I'm transposing the keyboard intro and sax parts to guitar. Might try and do it on sax, but not sure if I Can switch instruments onstage quick enough, there's no time between intro and sax.

Some of those took us a while to put together, we've done South City Midnight Lady (Doobies) but didn't think we could do it justice onstage so it fell off the list. Most of that stuff you can't just throw together, we covered those long ago. Things like Who'll Stop the Rain, Little Sister, Dust in the Wind...mostly go over vocals and it's on the list. Now we're getting into things we have to actually work on for the most part, that means a pretty well structured practice. We've put together tougher ones before so we know we can do it, just takes some time...When I left here years ago we were working on Styx Too much Time on my Hands and Fat Bottom Girls, had Sultans of Swing on the list, and a few others I can't remember. I think we might also be putting Seven Bridges Road back on the list too...

It's fun, but that's the way we handle practice, 20 minutes or so and move on to something else, go back over the new ones at the end of the night at least once. Usually a couple of times...

Cool list Billy, I would love to see you guys play! Sure wished I lived closer.
We have learned about 60 to 65 songs. I haven't counted them but I know it's enough for 4 - 1 hour(plus) sets. We are working on getting more gigs. Most of the guys are taking vacations in the month of April as of now we have one gig for April. We are going to schedule a day in a recording studio to record a descent demo hopefully in April. It's a matter of getting all our personal schedules in sinc. We are all wanting to add new songs!

Main problem we have is day job schedules. It's not easy to play till 2AM then be up and ready for work at 4:30 so we've been playing a few restaurants in town where we can shut down earlier, but it seems a couple of guys with acoustics have most weekends booked up for 3 or 4 months so not many gigs so far. I've been thinking about looking around for something else, fill ins or whatever.

That's a partial list, mostly just the ones where we do a bunch by one group. So far we have 4 full 45 minute sets plus a few songs, all printed up in set lists with drum settings. We use a keyboard drum machine. Always adding more though, and along the way we drop old ones now and then we're tired of. So far it's mostly stuff we like to do, rather than whatever we have to do to satisfy a crowd. And it's a different atmosphere than playing clubs, we don't have to be a living juke box for the dance floor so we have a lot more leeway to do things people can just sit and listen to. I can't see some of our set list on a dance bar set list...like Helplessly Hoping or Ventura Highway. Others would work anywhere...some of them we did years ago in clubs too, most of those were the ones we could just go through a couple of times and move on.

It's a lot of fun, and we keep a very low volume level. I've been using the Fender Champ for most of my leads, Super Reverb on about 3 1/2 or 4 for cleans. In clubs I used to crank that thing to 10 and use the normal channel for leads. Also maxed out...really different now, at a volume level where a 6 watt amp is actually not cranked wide open, I usually have it on about 8.

I wish you could get up here too, I think you'd enjoy it. Alan is probably the best bass player in town, all 3 good voices, Shane is excellent at rhythm guitar, all 3 do lead vocals so nobody has to carry the load all night and it's a pretty good song list. I'm surprised at some of the requests we got too. One guy wanted all the blues tunes we could come up with, we had to improvise a couple, another wanted Pink Floyd...at a restaurant...odd..

Do any of you guys write songs?

I write a lot of songs.

I usually get at the least 1/2 of them recorded in a "slightly less than gunna make you puke" audio format so that I can put them on a CD for all my tone deaf friends.
Later on I generally take those back to my edit and remix where I do a far better mix and add some more flavor to them in some cases. When I don't feel like pickin I generally remix or write new stuff. Sometimes I just listen to it for days to find little things I would never notice otherwise. It's all fun. It's all music.

Do any of you guys write songs?

Well, yeah! Since Friday night I was recording tracks for two older songs I'm redoing (one didn't make the cut for my last CD and the other never got past the demo stage), plus recorded (and remixed) some new tracks for a song that I wasn't happy about the lsat mix - I had been trying to get a sax player to record a track, but gave up finding one who would work for free/track exchange - they all wanted $100/hour - and recorded a guitar doing the part instead.
Then I've got 3 or 4 songs that haven't made it past the 1-guitar/vocal demo stage yet.
I'm to the point where I have enough songs for my next album in some stage of production, and will have to cut the weak ones from the list as I continue to work on them.

I wrote about 50 songs in '09-'11. Only about 5, since then. Hmmm. That was the year my kid was born. Strange!

is there ANYONE on this forum who DOESN'T write songs???????

if there is, i ain't met 'em!

welcome to BM, Rhythm man.

is there ANYONE on this forum who DOESN'T write songs???????

if there is, i ain't met 'em!

welcome to BM, Rhythm man.

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Thanks, man. But I'm not actually a new member, I've been around since about 2006 or so, I guess.
I had quit, deleted my account, and later came back again when I saw there was a bunch of good guys here.
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On topic:
I always have a catalog of hastily recorded originals to work with, and develop. But - of course - I only want to actually work with & develop the songs I like the most.
Some songs I had written then may no longer grab me, now.
I may have recorded a song when I was really sad, or really happy, for instance.
So, when I listen to that 'quickly-recorded song' a week or month or year later, I may be in a different mood, and not want anything to do with the song.
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Another thing that often happens, is that I trip across a few chords that sound great with a specific rhythm to them.
I guess I'm talking about a 'hook' . . .
But - if you change the rhythm - the hook is gone, and it's just nothing; mediocre at best.
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You ever write down some chords for a GREAT sounding song you found? And then -the next day - you play the chords - and it sounds like crap? Nothing like the way you'd played them yesterday.

. . . and the song is gone forever.
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A lot of times, all you need to do is get those first few chords in the right rhythm, and the rest of the song writes itself.

Thanks, man. But I'm not actually a new member, I've been around since about 2006 or so, I guess.

Yeah I remember your avatar of your fingertips...been a while, probably longer than I've been around here.

I write now and then but not often. Song ideas pop into my head a lot when I'm doodling, most of the time I get a basic chord progression going then nothing interesting to fill it out. Almost always so boring I eventually scrap it. Lyrics is my downfall. I can think up a line or two maybe, then 2 weeks later I still don't have a thing to go with it. Usually if I do come up with a decent line it's something that just pops into my head, out of nowhere, and I'll try to come up with something to add to it and still nothing 3 hours later...the few I Have completed have usually ended up in the trash where they belong. Utter crap...

I've finished a couple, I think 3 are on my player and a couple more are partially done. A couple worked out pretty well but no lyrics, one is a good rhythm part but I can't put a decent lead to it to save my life. The general style in my head is something right up Eric Johnson's alley, and I can't come within 3 miles of his style. I recorded a rhythm track 5 or 6 years ago and every time I try a lead it sucks out loud. And I'm no slouch at lead, this is just completely beyond my playing style.

Silhouette of A Daydream is one of my all time favorite originals, I never get tired of playing it. Last Train is good I think, but I need to start over and completely redo it, add bass and drums, keys and flute if possible, would love to have a banjo part but don't know anyone who has one I could use for it. Tried it one day in a music store and it works perfect, just don't have access to the instrument. All of it is in my head, need to get the band together and start working on a better recording. Desperately Electric Tea is one I wrote in the mid 80's, another acoustic finger picking tune, always intended to be a solo acoustic tune just like Silhouette. A friend came up with the name...those are all on my player.

Desperately Electric Tea was recorded using just a typical Sound Blaster sound card and a cheap $10 computer condenser mic, just to show what is possible with very basic stuff. The others were done with a Tascam cassette 4 track, bypassing the cassette and using the line out into the computer input. Last Train was several tracks, all recorded with Audacity.

As you can tell I'm not much of a songwriter, but when I come up with a keeper it's usually pretty decent. I've been working on a couple of others recently, still trying to figure out where i want to go from the main chord progression...I've never been crazy about the typical 3 or 4 chord I, IV, V stuff, I try to do something not so ordinary. That's the hangup most of the time...